Recycling Enabled Autonomous Cell Culture System

Characterization of the effects of radiation on biological specimens Beyond Low Earth Orbit (BLEO), while dealing with the difficulties of isolation and distance from earth presents a challenging problem for multiple reasons. Organisms require that physiologically relevant environmental conditions to be maintained for optimal performance, including temperature, pressure, pH, and dissolved gases. Additionally, nutrients need to be added to the culture to facilitate sustained cell growth, and these nutrients must be balanced against the cells’ secretion of waste products into their microenvironment. Due to the minimal power available and a limited supply of compressed gas, feed, and fresh media, there is a finite time that experiments can theoretically run. Sciperio will apply their innovations in biomanufacturing to biologic experiments on the International Space Stations (ISS) or commercial space stations as a proving ground before extended BLEO missions. Many of the challenges presented such as automation, resource management, in-situ measurements, and autonomous decision making have been addressed by Sciperio. A key technology that will be adapted is the media recycling capability which presents a clearly unique solution to the metabolic waste generated by cells and has a minimum 20 to 1 weight and volume reduction in the media needs for a biologic experiments. Sciperio’s modular and highly sensorized bioreactor will be adapted to the space domain and will allow for in line analysis and environmental control as well as parallel or expandable cultures. A database and supporting software developed will allow for logging and remote monitoring of bioreactor operations and Machine Learning algorithms that are currently under development give a clear path to augmented or fully autonomous experimental decisions to be made. Characterization of radiation on biological specimens Beyond Low Earth Orbit (BLEO), presents a challenging problem. Organisms require that physiologically relevant environmental conditions be maintained and nutrients added to the culture to facilitate sustained cell growth. These nutrients must be balanced against the cells’ secretion of waste products which limits the time experiments can theoretically run. Sciperio looks to enable autonomous long term biologic experiments BLEO. Through automation, resource management, in-situ measurements, and autonomous decision making. A key technology that will be adapted is the media recycling capability which presents a clearly unique solution to the metabolic waste generated by cells and has a minimum 20 to 1 weight and volume reduction in the media needs for a biologic experiments. Sciperio’s modular sensorized bioreactor will be adapted to the space domain and allows for in line analysis and environmental control. Machine Learning algorithms are currently under development for fully autonomous experimental decisions to be made.

The technology developed will be able to support biological experiments upon the ISS and on future BLEO missions which can involve research for drug discovery, disease diagnosis, stem cell research, and microgravity effects on the human body. Additionally, the control systems for environmental factors inside of the culture can be applied to similar or future equipment. The potential non-NASA customers are spread across commercial, government and universities. They include companies such as Pfizer, Merck, and Amgen that are investing in space-based research for drug development and protein crystallization, the Department of Defense, which are interested advanced regenerative medicine, universities and national laboratories conducting microgravity-based biological research and Commercial space companies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin, Axiom Space, and Sierra Space, which are developing next-generation space habitats and research platforms.

This is a mature technology (TRL 7+) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.

None of these are guaranteed paths for this specific project — TechPort itself doesn't have an "apply" button. Reaching out to the contact(s) above with a specific question is usually the fastest way to find out what's actually open.